See You at Reunion. Or Maybe Not.

I writea faculty blog for Saint Michael's College and just addressed the issue of college reunions. While many of our returning alums ARE connected with each other AND whether those connections are through social networking on the web OR through small gatherings WITH each other, I suspect that what they are looking for is a re-connection with that place where they learned, loved, fell, got back up, challenged, questioned and GREW UP. They can't find that on the web. The usual questions of how are you, how are the kids, what are you doing soon slid into how is the College? How is the new President? Are students still treated fairly? How is professor XX, etc. These alums who return for reunion are looking for reassurance that the place they once called "home" IS still home to a new generation of students. They want to make sure that their vision of what college WAS like is still intact. Social networking can and does enchance their relationships which may have been started IN college but is can never replace the return and the opportunity to seek reassurances. If you are interested in my blog - go to smcvt.edu and search blogs - the title of my most recent blog is Who do people return for reunions????

Facebook, MySpace, etc. only makes the reunion experience more pleasant. Meeting a group of people you haven't seen in years, or heard about in years, is an awkward experience. It's meeting strangers and acting like you're still the closest of friends. Online profiles help to alleviate some of that, you have a focus point to initiate conversations, knowing how things have been and being able to work off of that. Familiarity shouldn't be a ruining point for a reunion, it should be a boost, and I think these predictions are made incorrectly because the people making them are from older generations who still have never actively experienced this form of keeping in touch with people. The ones who understand the potential results the most are the ones who actively use the software, not the ones who have never used them for personal use. It's the ones who do see the results personally who should be making the predictions, and this rarely being the case is why over the past decade just about all personal computer software and communication programs have had drastically incorrect results predicted.

I agree with JBinLA. I just got back from my graduate school reunion and Facebook made it even better. I felt connected to my classmates who were Facebook friends and had a great jumping off point for a conversation, e.g. So how was Hong Kong? How is baby Jack? I can't tell you how many mentions Facebook got at reunions - all positive!

While I'd still like to see old friends in person, MySpace and Facebook have their place in making that better.
Primarily because I'd rather be informed about someone's life when I see them as opposed to "Hey Bob, what have you been up to?" "I'm selling insurance, married, two kids. You?" "Me? Oh, well I moved to Washington, work for a consulting firm. Never married, no kids. " "Great, well, good seeing you." "You too." Th

I never could figure out why people wanted to go to reunions. Why live in the past instead of going forward? Why pay attention to those annoying zeros from your your old HS and college days, when you have a current life and family to attend to? I have no patience with anyone who spends more time on their past than on their future.

I attended a study abroad program in England ten years ago. We lived and went to school in a hundred room Manor, and got to travel most weekends. There's no way that a hundred and fifty of us will gather from across America for an evening get-together, so I set up a FaceBook group for a virtual ten year reunion. We're at 34 and counting & everyone is enjoying it.,

I attended a study abroad program in England ten years ago. We lived and went to school in a hundred room Manor, and got to travel most weekends. There's no way that a hundred and fifty of us will gather from across America for an evening get-together, so I set up a FaceBook group for a virtual ten year reunion. We're at 34 and counting & everyone is enjoying it.,